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Wael Zwaiter
Wael Zwaiter (1935-16 October 1972) was the representative of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in Italy who also served as an Arabic-Italian translator. He was suspected of being the leader of the Black September Organization in Rome, and was assassinated by Israel in Operation Wrath of God. Biography Wael Zwaiter was born in 1935 in Nablus, Mandatory Palestine, and studied Arabic literature and philosophy at the University of Baghdad in the Kingdom of Iraq. He joined the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and worked as a representative in Italy and worked as a translator for the Libyan embassy. He spoke Arabic, Italian, French, and English. In August 1972 he was arrested by Italian police for a bombing of an oil refinery, but was later released. Mossad believed him to be the leader of the Black September Organization (BSO) in Rome, and in the aftermath of the Munich Massacre, he was the first man that Israel targeted. He was also accused of the bombing of El Al Flight 76 and building another bomb in August 1972. Zwaiter was by then a broke poet in Rome, Italy, who was about to release his Italian translation of Arabian Nights. A Kidon squad under Avner Kaufman was sent to Rome, where they were informed that Zwaiter was a broke poet in the city at the time; Kaufman met with two Germans from the Baader-Meinhof Group who told Kaufman about the location of Zwaiter in the city. Kaufman, who spoke German fluently, promised to pay his up-and-rising contact $300,000 if he would assist him in tracking down Zwaiter. Although the Baader-Meinhof Group was anti-West and anti-Israel, his contact Andreas believed that Kaufman was a freelance operative who bought and sold information on the locations of terrorists; he also did not question Kaufman, as he needed hard cash to fund the group. Kaufman was assisted by a gypsy woman who followed Zwaiter in her car, and she told the kidoni of Zwaiter's location. Death Zwaiter left his small announcement of his book's release to go to a store, where he picked up some food, a bottle of milk, and a bottle of wine, also making a phone call at a tavern (his home phone was shut down because he ran out of money to pay for it). While he waited for the elevator at his apartment, he was encountered by Kaufman and his assistant Robert, a Belgian Jewish bomb-maker for Mossad, in the dimly-lit lobby. Kaufman turned the lights on to identify Zwaiter, and he waited behind him in line for the elevator. However, as they had just walked down the stairs and were about to go in the elevator to go back up, it raised Zwaiter's suspicion. Kaufman and Robert aimed guns at him and asked him if he knew why they were there; Zwaiter spoke softly in Arabic and tried to get them to lower their guns, putting his hand on their guns and lowering them slowly. Confused about what to do, the two of them hesitated, but they shot him 14 times with Beretta .22 caliber pistols. When he fell to the floor, he crushed the bottles of wine and milk, creating a pool of those drinks as well as his blood. He was the first Palestinian to be killed during Operation Wrath of God. Category:1935 births Category:1972 deaths Category:PLO Category:Black September Category:Killed Category:Palestinians Category:Orthodox Christians Category:Palestinian socialists Category:Socialists